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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24460273">What's left behind</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bethesda/pseuds/Bethesda'>Bethesda</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Metal Gear</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Autopsies, Corpses, Former Lovers - Freeform, M/M, Memories, Mentor/Protégé, Post MGS1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 00:47:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,520</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24460273</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bethesda/pseuds/Bethesda</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After Shadow Moses, Snake asks to see Miller's body.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kazuhira Miller/Solid Snake</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>What's left behind</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>First of all, English is definitely not my first language, so you may find a lot of mistakes, expecially with the conscutio temporum.<br/>Sorry for that, correct me if you can and want.<br/>Second, thank you!<br/>Hope you enjoy it.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He asked to see his body.</p>
<p>At first Campbell didn’t agree with it, but after what all had happened he definitely owed him one.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They arranged for him a military flight, a pretty long one, and somehow he managed to sleep a while. He didn’t dream anything at all, his mind too overcrowded with memories of what had just happened.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They had moved his body in a military base a few hours before.</p>
<p>Appropriate, for a man whom had always been a mercenary.</p>
<p>Not the life ending he would have imagined himself, not after his decision to retire, but appropriate anyway.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Snake was taken in charge by two guards who didn’t speak to him at all, and he was pretty grateful for that.</p>
<p>Maybe those were their orders, maybe it was his face – still battered by torture and the punches that he had exchanged with his brother – that was literally screaming “Don’t you dare to talk to me right now”, but they let him inside the tortuous buildings, ‘till they arrived to the medical one.</p>
<p>Of course they had to go downstairs.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They let him inside a cold room, clean, the air stinking of disinfectants.</p>
<p>There was just one man waiting for him, a doctor, whom nodded at him but didn’t ask anything at all. Surely Campbell had already let them know about what he wanted.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The man said to follow him, that he had already arranged everything.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Snake crossed the room, surpassing two empty autopsy table, reaching for the man who had already a hand on the handle of one of the mortuary refrigerators.</p>
<p>The soldier nodded, nothing more, and after a few seconds there he was.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>His skin was pale with a tint of blue, signs of struggle all over his torso and face. He was wearing none of his prosthetics.</p>
<p>Snake asked for the doctor to leave him alone for a while, and the man disappeared without a word, his steps echoing in the emptiness of the room.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>«You look way older, Master. Retirement never suited you», he managed to say, voice still.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>That wasn’t really trued: Kazuhira Miller was sixty years old, but somehow managed to seem younger, maybe because his white hairs were well hidden between the blonde ones, maybe because his eyes and wrinkles were always behind his glasses and maybe because he was still a soldier, even while retired, and his body was still fit as twenty years prior.</p>
<p>But damn, on that table he was different.</p>
<p>He was weak.</p>
<p>He was fucking dead, dammit.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Dave’s mind was struggling to grasp the concept.</p>
<p>In his mind Master Miller was a piece of shit who haunted his dreams with his crazy trainings, his punishments, his faked emergencies in the middle of the night that had driven some of his mates to leave Fox Hound.</p>
<p>He was the man whom had tied him to a pole in the middle of the base, under the August sun, to see how much he could resist.</p>
<p>The answer was “A lot”.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And now that devil was lying still, cold as ice, and suddenly he realized that there was nothing more that could link him to his own past.</p>
<p>Nor Big Boss, nor Frank.</p>
<p>And now neither Miller.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He couldn’t stop biting his own tongue almost till making it bleed and suddenly his right hand was a fist, hitting violently the stall above the one where Miller was lying, the sound of metal echoing all over the place.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He stood like that for what seemed an eternity, is eyes unable to focus, and when at last he regained his consciousness he remembered the last time they had seen each other.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It was right after his last mission for Fox Hound, when he had come back to the base and everyone there already knew what he had done.</p>
<p>What Big Boss had done.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And Miller was—devastated.</p>
<p>He couldn’t even talk to him reasonably because his master was completely out of his mind – his office destroyed - without any doubt drunk.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And right in that moment David had gotten it.</p>
<p>That what he had had with Miller was a lie.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>There had never been a real romance between them at the time: Dave had fallen in Kazuhira’s arms with some kind of innocence, attracted by his past, his being so assertive and obscure and tormented. He had classified his attraction toward the man as a simple crush, nothing more, and he had hidden it for a while.</p>
<p>But then something had happened in between the survival trainings and punishments and somehow they had become something.</p>
<p>David never had had a word to describe what.</p>
<p>His master was definitely attracted by him and even though he had tried to step back for a while, he had  never been able to resist him.</p>
<p>Not that Dave, being the rookie he was, had ever tried to make him fall for him.</p>
<p>It was Miller himself that struggled with some ideas that his student couldn’t grasp, and it was beyond the fact that an eventual relationship would have been considered not only inappropriate but also forbidden between the walls of the base.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>But they had found each other anyhow.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>There were really no needs of words between them.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Just hands, kisses and bites.</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>But right after his first solo mission Dave had gotten what he hadn’t grasped in the past.</p>
<p>And he had realized it when he had told Miller about his discovery about Big Boss.</p>
<p>About being his son.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And he had seen it, hidden behind his sunglasses, what was going on there.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Miller had never wanted him.</p>
<p>He had wanted his commander, the father of his lover, who apparently looked so much like him when he was young.</p>
<p>Dave was just an inferior copy, but it was as much as Kazuhira could have gotten from Big Boss.</p>
<p>But all the deceptions and lies had fallen that night, when he had returned to the base as a hero.</p>
<p>As a patricidal.</p>
<p>And what he had found was the man he loved wasted, devastated, angry.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>That was the last time they had seen each other.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>There was Zanzibarland, of course, but Miller had refused to see him in person even after, and right after having given his help via radio to kill once again his former commander, Miller had disappeared.</p>
<p>Retired.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And now he was there, right under his eyes.</p>
<p>And there was nothing more left between them, just memories of what had happened.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Dave could feel tears stinging his eyes, trying to escape, but he fought them back.</p>
<p>He had lost so many companions in his life, that wasn’t different from the other times.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He didn’t even know why he was there.</p>
<p>He hadn’t seen the man in ten years, for God’s sake.</p>
<p>And surely he would have mocked him for being so sensitive.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><em>Fucking Miller</em>, he snorted, letting a hand on the dead man shoulder, the only one he had left.</p>
<p>Dave almost backed away when he felt how cold the other one was, even though that wasn’t definitely the first time he had touched a dead body.</p>
<p>But the last time he had laid a hand over the other one his skin was so warm under his touch.</p>
<p>Dave kept it there, almost forcing himself, and somehow he found himself caressing him till reaching his head, his long, blonde hair.</p>
<p>He let his fingers untangle the little knots he had and lost track of time doing it, till his eyes focused on the only piece of fabric that was covering the other one, over the chest.</p>
<p>Dave didn’t need to reveal to himself what was under it.</p>
<p>He already knew.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Liquid had shot him.</p>
<p>His only curiosity was if it had happened from the back or if his brother had had the decency to let Miller die as he had lived, with no fear in front of danger, courage, honour.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Liquid and Kazuhira knew each other.</p>
<p>He didn’t know why nor in which terms.</p>
<p>The soldier didn’t really want to know.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Snake tried to block those thoughts and decided that it was time to go.</p>
<p>He had to go back to his dogs, to his life.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>A part of him wanted to go like that, without adding anything, but he couldn’t.</p>
<p>He leaned over his mentor and former lover and kissed his forehead for what seemed an eternity.</p>
<p>When he was done, he reached for a pocket and took out of it a pair of sunglasses.</p>
<p>Miller’s sunglasses.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He had recovered them from Liquid’s body.</p>
<p>For some reason his brother had taken them as a trophy and they had fallen out of a pocket right after his defeat.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He made Miller wear them and somehow seeing him like that seemed more natural.</p>
<p>Less painful.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Dave saluted him as he had always done in front of the others members of Fox Hound when he was a rookie: as a soldier.</p>
<p>And then there was nothing else to say.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He gave his back to the body and exited the room, never watching behind himself.</p>
<p>Another chapter had been closed.</p>
<p>It was time to rest.</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>If you made it till here, thank you!<br/>Tell me if you liked it &lt;3</p></blockquote></div></div>
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